High winds were the culprits in power failures, phone and internet outages and thousands of dollars in moderate damages and road closures Tuesday throughout much of northeastern Nevada and eastern Utah.
Part and parcel of an early spring storm the winds swept across the region with gust measured around 60 to 70 miles per hour. While the ind speed was noted what was truly unusual about Tuesdays storm was of it size covering most of the Great Basin from southern Nevada and Utah into Idaho and Wyoming.
The storm came on the heels of earlier wintry blast the blanketed much of region in a dusting of snow. But the earlier spring storm packed none of the punch of Tuesday blow out. Semi trucks were tossed around like children’s toys in the gusts.
Strong winds gusting over 70 mph triggered deadly accidents Tuesday in Nevada and Utah, including a 17-vehicle pileup that killed one person and injured at least 16 others, authorities said.
According to West Wendover Police reports at just before 1:00 pm s a semi truck was traveling east bound on Interstate 80 at mile marker 408 when a strong gust of wind caught the trailer nearly tipping the semi over on the freeway. The semi tractor and trailer instead traveled off the south edge of the freeway through the desert towards Wendover Boulevard. As the semi traveled south through the desert it went through a fence and overturned onto Wendover Boulevard coming to rest on its side, blocking travel lanes in both directions. The semi was being driven by Luis Buenaventura of Ogden Utah. No other vehicles were involved and no other passengers were in the semi during this incident.
Wendover Boulevard was closed for about 2.5 hours while crews cleared the semi from the roadway. Buenaventura was taken to the Northern Nevada Regional Hospital in Elko Nevada for treatment. Injuries observed at the scene included some bumps and bruises. The semi trailer was empty, which was a factor in the wind being able to blow the semi off the interstate.
While the Wendover crash was the ,lost spectacular it was not alone. After two truck were blown over in Utah, Interstate 80 from Lake Point to Wendover was shut down to all high profile vehicles.
As winds whipped across the Salt Flats with enough velocity to snap light poles in half on Tuesday, Wells Rural Electric Co. (WREC) line crews in Wendover worked diligently through challenging conditions to repair damaged equipment and restore electricity in a timely manner.
Outages in the Wendover community were first reported just after 2 p.m. to WREC’s Outage Dispatch Center. With several outages reported in the area and throughout WREC’s service territory, WREC’s crews went to work quickly identifying the issues and then restoring electricity. Power was back on for approximately 90 percent of WREC owners in the Wendover community by 5 p.m. after crews identified and replaced several broken wires. After restoring power in Wendover, crews moved out onto the Salt Flats to resolve the remaining outages in the area.
While power outages are part of doing business in the electricity industry, Tuesday’s efforts were just the latest example of WREC’s culture of safety and reliability. WREC hasn’t had a lost-time accident in 648,637 hours and the average WREC owner was without power for less than 10 minutes in all of 2014.
During the course of Tuesday’s outages, WREC owners played an important role in speeding up the restoration of their power. The Outage Dispatch Center fielded several calls from owners without electricity, which provided invaluable information to help WREC crews locate and troubleshoot the cause of outages as quickly as possible. The more information received by the Outage Dispatch Center, the quicker WREC crews can identify the scale of an outage and pinpoint the problem.
While power remained on in West Wendover cable, internet and some phone service was interrupted.
Owners experiencing an outage are encouraged to call the 24-hour Outage Dispatch Center at (800) 566-6696. Aside from helping WREC find the cause of outages faster, the dispatch center also provides updates and follow-up phone calls to owners who report outages. Owners can also check the status of outages at www.WREC.coop And on the cooperative’s social media pages.
Farther south in Ely high winds ripped through the White Pine County seat causing thousands of dollars in property damage.
